


While The Cat's Away

by JohnAmendAll



Category: Doctor Who (1963)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-08
Updated: 2015-01-08
Packaged: 2018-03-06 18:03:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 882
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3143564
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JohnAmendAll/pseuds/JohnAmendAll
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ace and Susan Q take the opportunity to profane Helen A's bedroom.</p>
            </blockquote>





	While The Cat's Away

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Liadt](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Liadt/gifts).



"How much more of this is there?" Ace asked. Conducting a room-by-room search of Helen A's palace had seemed a good idea at the time, but she hadn't bargained on the recently deposed dictator's megalomania. In Ace's considered judgement, the palace was bigger than all the other buildings she'd been in on Terra Alpha, put together. 

"Not a lot," Susan Q reassured her. She gestured with her gun at the double doors at the end of the corridor. "I think we just need to check in there." 

Ace gave the doors a truculent look. "Looks important. What is it? Throne room or something?" 

"Let's find out." Susan raised the gun. "On a count of three. One. Two. Three!" 

Ace kicked the door open, and Susan darted inside. A moment later, she reappeared. 

"All clear, I think," she said, sounding a little taken aback. "Want to take a look?" 

The two advanced into the room. It was decorated in much the same style as the remainder of the palace, with designs that had been fashionable and ultra-modern perhaps thirty years before. From the walls, huge portraits of Helen A smirked down at the two rebels — and at the colossal double bed which stood in the centre of the room, on a slight daïs. Gold threads glistened in its freshly-laundered sheets. 

"The greedy..." Susan tailed off, and shook her head. "In the Patrol we slept in barracks. Ten girls to a room." 

"Yeah, well, she always was a scumbag," Ace said. She kicked at the door of a walk-in wardrobe, exposing a collection of pearl-studded dresses in shades of pink, red and purple. "What's going to happen to all this rubbish?" 

Susan touched one of the dresses. "I suppose they could be recycled... I'm not sure what into. Seat covers, maybe." 

"More likely just burn the lot." Ace turned to one of the portraits. "The same goes for those things. I can't stand them staring at me like that." 

A few minutes later, the room had, in Ace's opinion, been vastly improved. The portraits were now on the floor, their canvasses kicked through in various places, and the black-and-white decor had been enlivened by a number of spraypainted slogans — some cheering on the killjoys, others (to Susan's bemusement) in support of Charlton Athletic. 

"We've made a terrible mess," Susan said, half-guiltily, as she surveyed their handywork. 

"Just you wait," Ace said. "I haven't even got started yet. You know what'd really get under Helen A's skin?" 

"What?" 

Ace's only answer was to unzip her jacket and give the double bed a meaningful glance. 

"Ace!" Susan's voice was a whisper. "You're... you're thinking what I'm thinking, aren't you?" 

"Dunno what you're thinking," Ace said. "I just thought she'd get the heeby-jeebies if she knew we were doing it in her bed." She looked at Susan. "If you're up for it, I mean." 

"I've never been with..." Susan might have been blushing, but Ace couldn't tell through her thick makeup. 

"But you want to, don't you?" Ace advanced on her. "Calling me cute all the time and going on about my dimples. I can take a hint." 

Susan opened her mouth, closed it, managed to say "That isn't what I...", tailed off again, sat down on the bed and set her gun to one side. 

"Sorry," she said. "I just keep thinking, if I say it out loud, I'll be shot for promoting moral degeneracy." She took a deep breath, then pulled her wig off, revealing cropped brown hair. "OK, here goes. You're right, Ace. I want you." 

Ace threw herself onto the bed beside her. "Then that's what you're gonna get." 

⁂

"They've been a long time," Earl Sigma said, pacing Helen A's office. "D'you think they've run into trouble?" 

"If they have, I'd have expected more shouting and explosions." The Doctor was calmly leafing through Helen A's papers. "No, I'm sure Ace can handle whatever she finds up there... Ah!" 

Ace had appeared in the doorway. Her feet were bare, her hair was in disarray, and though she was wearing her bomber jacket it wasn't clear what, if anything, she had on underneath it. 

"Have you found anything untoward?" the Doctor asked her. 

"Not yet," Ace replied, making for one of the other exits from the office. "Still got a few bits and pieces to go into." 

"You've made a study of human psychology, Earl," the Doctor said, as Ace disappeared from view. "What do you make of my young friend?" 

Earl shrugged. "I'm only a student, Doctor. But it looked to me like she'd been having a good time." 

"Yes, probably breaking something. Or several somethings." The Doctor looked round as Ace came back into the room, now with a silver spray can in her hand. "I hope that isn't Nitro-Nine you've been preparing against my direct instructions." 

Ace gave him an innocent look. "It's just whipped cream, Professor." By way of proof, she held out the can. 

"So I see. And... is that a bottle of chocolate sauce in your pocket?" 

"I kept telling you, Professor. I'm starving." Butter wouldn't have melted in Ace's mouth. "Can I go now? Like I said, we haven't finished up there." 

"Very well. Oh, and Ace?" 

"Yeah?" 

"Enjoy your picnic." 

Ace grinned. "Don't worry, Professor. We will."


End file.
